


Cat's Got Our Tounge

by joyances



Category: Venom (Movie 2018)
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Other, alternatively: venom gets a cat, slightly canon divergent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-18
Updated: 2018-11-18
Packaged: 2019-08-03 22:39:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16334576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joyances/pseuds/joyances
Summary: Eddie combs the shore hopelessly, expecting to find nothing. He doesn't find anything. But something does find him. He's about ready to give up, leaning against a large rock and rubbing at his sprained ankle, when a cat appears out of nowhere to sit at his feet. It's tiny, half the size of his and Anne's cat, with shorter fur. It's all black, slick and slimy looking where it's fur is matted down with water, and it's golden eyes stand out almost frighteningly against it's fur."Hey there," Eddie says, lowering himself carefully to the cat's level and offering it a hand to sniff, "Where'd you come from?"The cat doesn't sniff his hand, it just stares at him, unblinking. It's unnerving. Then it's eyes swirl white for just a second, and Eddie sucks in a startled breath."Venom?" He asks, incredulous and unbelieving.





	Cat's Got Our Tounge

The rocky shoreline below the Life Foundation is foggy and almost chilly in the early morning hours. There's wreckage and debris everywhere, and the smell of rocket fuel and smoke lingers in the air even now, almost a day later. It's eerie, and silent here. The only sound the lapping of the waves against the rocks. There are no birds singing to greet the dawn that's not far off, not even any gulls crying. No seals barking. Nothing. It's as if all life has fled the area.

Eddie slips and stumbles as he works his way along the shore. It's not really a beach, per say. Just a bunch of jagged, uneven rocks. Eddie quickly winds up with a multitude of bruises and scrapes, two shoes full of salt water, and one twisted ankle. Some people would be glad to find themselves rid of their parasite. Some people. Not Eddie. He's out here, having ducked beneath police lines the moment all the officers had left for the night, looking for any sign that Venom made it.

He's really not expecting one, if he's brutally honest with himself. He can clearly remember the sight of Venom, spread out above him and burning. He can remember the feeling of flames licking at his skin through his bond with Venom. Can feel the symbiote's fear, and the relief when Eddie is safe, sinking beneath the waves where the fire can't hurt him. And then Eddie is alone in his brain again. Empty. Cold, despite the Californian warmth. So he combs the beach hopelessly, already expecting to find nothing. Even if the fire hadn't killed Venom, symbiotes can't survive without a host. Venom is surely dead. Eddie keeps looking anyway.

He doesn't find anything. But something does find him. He's about ready to give up, leaning against a large rock and rubbing at his sprained ankle, when a cat appears out of nowhere to sit at his feet. It's tiny, half the size of his and Anne's cat, with shorter fur. It's all black, slick and slimy looking where it's fur is matted down with water, and it's golden eyes stand out almost frighteningly against it's fur.

"Hey there," Eddie says, lowering himself carefully to the cat's level and offering it a hand to sniff, "Where'd you come from?"

The cat doesn't sniff his hand, it just stares at him, unblinking. It's unnerving. Then it's eyes swirl white for just a second, and Eddie sucks in a startled breath.

"Venom?" He asks, incredulous and unbelieving.

The cat just stares at him some more, it's eyes remaining stubbornly gold and not white. Eddie is not at all convinced that this cat is Venom. He is, in fact, very doubtful. But at this point, it's all he has to hold onto. And going home with a cat that may or may not be Venom is much better than going home empty handed. In the end, the cat is willing enough to be picked up, in fact it even curls inside Eddie's hoodie for warmth almost instantly.

The walk back to the bike is too long; Eddie's ankle throbs and threatens to give out under him; he's chilly enough now to shiver; his boots slosh and squish with every step; but the cat is warm against his chest and he can even feel it begin to vibrate as it purrs in contentment. So really, things aren't that bad.

* * *

When they get back to his apartment, Eddie finds out the hard way that cats (or maybe symbiotes) do not enjoy baths.

* * *

When the cat is clean and dry, and Eddie has taken care of all his scrapes and scratches, Eddie feels his stomach begin to rumble. It's time to head out and get something to eat, and with that thought he realizes he has to find something for the cat to eat. If he's right about his hunch, and the cat really is Venom, then they won't eat normal cat food. But what if it is just a cat?

Eddie heads into the nearest pet store and carefully reads every bag and can of food he sees. He fills a little handcart with a selection of wet cat foods; only the ones that boast real meat as the first ingredient. But he still doubts that Venom would be satisfied with just that. He wanders through the rest of the pet store as he thinks, tapping his fingers on the glass of the animal cages to release a little of his frustration. A thought occurs to him as he taps particularly hard on the cage of a snake that's giving him a dirty look. He leaves the store with his selection of cat food and a couple of feeder mice.

The cat is waiting for him when he opens the door, meowing irritably at him and swiping at his feet as he walks. It feels to Eddie as if he is being chastised for leaving the cat alone. Or maybe the cat is just hungry.

"Hey, kitty." Eddie stoops down to greet the cat, reaching a hand out for it to sniff. It gives him a dark look and nips at is fingers. "Are you mad at me, or are you just hungry?"

The cat sort of grumbles at him, before bunching it's legs up and leaping onto the counter to sniff at the bags. Eddie supposes that means the cat is hungry. He's hoping to god that the cat will eat cat food. He really doesn't want to watch it eat mice. So he leaves the box of mice in the bottom of a bag and scoops a can of cat food into a bowl and sets it down in front of the cat. It sniffs delicately at the bowl, before looking up at Eddie with an unimpressed look.

"What?" Eddie asks the cat, "Just try it. It can't be that bad, for what it cost."

The cat just continues to stare at him.

"Whatever, your choice," Eddie begins to dig through his own bags. Behind him he hears the sound of the bowl scraping quietly against the counter and when he sneaks a glance over his shoulder, the cat is slowly, almost reluctantly, eating. Eddie counts that as a win in his book.

In fact, caught up in this (admittedly very small) victory, and enjoying his own dinner, Eddie fails to notice when the cat takes interest in the skittering sound coming from the one bag still on the counter. By the time he notices, it's too late, and the bag is already pitching off the counter and onto the floor. The two feeder mice inside take off instantly. Eddie would be pissed off, but really, he thinks there were mice, and possibly rats, in the apartment to begin with. The cat, for it's part, leaps down from the counter and chases after the mice with relish.

Eddie is in no way surprised when it catches and practically swallows whole not one, but both of the mice. Not surprised, but a little turned off of his own dinner. The smug look on the cat's face as it watches him pick at his food makes Eddie just a little more certain that the cat is Venom.

* * *

Eddie and his cat do very little for the next few days. They go out together each day to get their dinners, his cat chewing angrily at the harness Eddie had bought when it became very clear that his cat didn't like being left alone. They lounge about in bed because the living room is still in shambles. The avoid picking up the phone when Anne calls.

Well, Eddie mostly does that last one by himself. And, really, he should have seen the knock on his door coming.

"Eddie," Anne calls. Eddie hadn't locked the door, and he hears it swing open. His cat, who is laying at Eddie's feet, perks up at the sound of Anne's voice, ears twitching in interest.

"Eddie, we're coming in ok?" This time it's Dan who speaks, and Eddie's cat pins it's ears back and slithers beneath the bed to hide. That's alright with Eddie. He's not sure how he feels about either of them seeing his cat.

Eddie doesn't even have time to get out of bed before Anne and Dan are there. Anne at least takes a few moments to look sorry for Eddie before she tells him he'll feel much better if he just cleans this place up a little. Dan, for his part, passes his arm-fulls of what appears to be food to Anne, before coming closer and asking Eddie how he feels. He sits on the edge of the bed, and checks Eddie's temperature with a thermometer he produced from out of nowhere, and questions Eddie about any symptoms he might still have.

The very moment Dan proclaims Eddie healthy(ish), Anne passes the food back off on Dan and hauls Eddie up. She's brought an entire arsenal of cleaning supplies and is not leaving until Eddie is not longer living in a dump. Or, at least until the dump Eddie lives in isn't full of rubble.

Eddie's cat hisses angrily at Dan every time he comes anywhere close to the bed. It's a miracle Dan doesn't notice. At one point, his cat swipes at Dan's feet with malicious intent.

"Stop it V!" Eddie says, as soon as Dan is in the other room, "I don't want them to notice you!"

The cat retreats under the bed, an area Eddie insists upon cleaning himself, and stays quiet.

In the end, they take out three bags of garbage, multiple piles of broken wood, and an entire bucket of broken glass. The broken out windows are covered in plastic, and Anne has harassed Eddie's landlord into promising to replace them as soon as possible. Anne has scrubbed every surface in the house until it comes close to shining. And Dan has replaced Eddie's bed sheets with something far less holey, complete with a cozy looking comforter Eddie doesn't remember owning.

The place didn't even look this good when Eddie moved in. And with piles of homemade food to eat (who knew Dan could cook) and the promise of future visits to come(they had a law suit to plan) Eddie has to admit that he does feel better. V,  lounging on a chair they had reset, already having caught that evening's mice, seems to feel about the same way.

* * *

In addition to feeling more comfortable in his own home, Eddie finds his creative drive returning with a vengeance. No longer content to simply sit around all day, Eddie busies himself with writing. The camera no longer called to him, but the written word seems to come easily. He loses himself in the click of the keys, writing out his own story (the heavily edited version). He isn't sure what he's going to do with it. Sell it to someone who would twist and change his words so they could sell it in turn? Or go the less profitable route and begin his own news blog?

Dinner time comes and passes with Eddie still typing away relentlessly. V paces circles around him, yowling. It is past time for them to go pick up supper and his cat is well aware of this. He shushes his cat, shooing V away with promises of just a few more words. An hour later and the cat is fed up. As Eddie stretches his arms, V leaps onto the table and spreads himself over the keyboard. Random letters begin to fill up the page.

"V, come on!" Eddie protests, reaching to push his cat away from the keyboard. V lets out a low warning noise and bites at Eddie's hand.

"You nuisance." V is unbothered by the accusation.

V does not get off the keyboard until Eddie relents and reaches for the harness. Later, Eddie has to get rid of twenty-three entire pages of keyboard smashed nonsense.

* * *

Anne wins Eddie's case for him almost effortlessly, and Eddie receives a larger settlement than he'd ever thought he'd see. Anne insists that Eddie celebrate by finding a new place to live. Eddie would protest, because apartment hunting is his least favorite thing, but his neighbor has gotten over their last encounter and the sound of his guitar makes V hide under the bed and hiss. The hot water heater has gone out too. Half the lights no longer work. So, apartment shopping it is.

Anne and Dan accompany him on his search, which makes it less frustrating than last time. And it doesn't hurt that he's not looking for the impossible to find slightly affordable shoebox in a very expensive city this time around. He has some money to spend.

Each place Anne and Dan take him to have some serious perks. A view of the bay that can't be beat. A community pool. A large deck with a hot tub. Heated tiles in the very large bathroom. But they also have one serious downside: a no pets policy. Anne stops having fun after the fifth week of constant rejects, and the next time they meet up for dinner she lets him know it.

"I just don't understand why we can't find you a place." Anne says, "We've looked at some amazing places, and you've turned them all down! It's not like you can't afford them, Eddie."

"What she's trying to say," Dan cuts in on Anne's rant, "Is that it would help us to know what you're looking for."

"Well," Eddie starts. It's time to come clean. Sort of. A little bit, "I kind of took in a stray cat. I want to keep it."

"And all those places didn't allow cats." Anne finishes the thought for him, "Is that all? Eddie, why didn't you just tell us?"

"I didn't think you'd think me having a cat was a good idea." Eddie admits. He doesn't want Dan and Anne to try and convince him to give V up, even if they think V is just a cat. Even if Eddie is starting to think V is just a cat.

"On the contrary," Anne says, slowly and thoughtfully, "I think it's a great idea. I think you need some company."

Dan agrees wholeheartedly and they both spend every moment in Eddie's apartment trying to coax V out from under the bed to pet him. Anne succeeds. Dan gets bitten more than once, but doesn't let that deter him.

* * *

"Are you sure it won't be awkward for you two?" Eddie asks, as they tour the first apartment he's actually tempted to take.

"Of course it won't be." It's Dan who speaks, but Eddie looks to Anne for confirmation. She nods encouragingly and that is that. Eddie somehow ends up living just four doors down from them in an apartment that's almost a mirror image of the one he used to share with Anne. It should be awkward, living that close to them. But Dan is a good man who is quickly becoming a good friend. And as for Anne. Well, Eddie thinks they make better friends than they ever did lovers. And that's a thought that he never expected to have.

All thoughts of awkwardness wash away when Anne and Dan step inside for the housewarming party they insisted on having, carrying two gifts. One, a very nice set of dishes for Eddie. The other, a tall cat tree to be placed by the window for V. V even lets Dan pet him once before biting him this time, and Eddie is happier than he's been in a long while. Even if his cat is just a cat and nothing more.

* * *

_Eddie is working at the kitchen table, writing a new post for his blog when the world around him grows hotter. The ceiling erupts in flames and he can feel them licking at his skin._

_Eddie is working at the table again and there's a knock on the door. He opens it to find Riot on the other side, grinning menacingly and shouldering their way inside._

_Anne is once again telling him she wants nothing to do with him. Dan is shaking his head in disappointment. Blood begins to drip onto the floor from the giant blade in Eddie's chest._

_He's falling endlessly, alone. His head empty of all but his own thoughts. Falling, falling, falling. Alone._

Just because Eddie is happy doesn't mean the nightmares have stopped.

As Eddie jerks awake from his latest night of unstable sleep, he reaches for the cat he knows will be sleeping beside him. V isn't the most affectionate cat in the world, but on nights like this the cat allows Eddie to stroke through it's fur and take comfort in it's presence. As if it can tell he needs the help.

"That was a bad one," He tells the cat.

He stares at the cat for a while, before saying something he's been thinking for a while.

"You're not Venom, are you?" He asks the cat, "You're just a cat. Venom's gone."

Eddie rolls over to stare at the ceiling.

"It's kind of pathetic that I keep hoping you're them. Even with Dan and Anne, I kind of feel alone without them in my head, you know."

Tears are prickling at Eddie's eyes. His cat surprises him by climbing carefully up onto Eddie's chest and laying down there, kneading softly at the blankets and purring. As Eddie watches it with watery eyes, the cat begins to melt for lack of a better word.

At first, Eddie feels nothing as what he thinks at first is black fur(but no, it's too shiny) spreads over his chest. Then it grows warm as it slowly, slowly seeps through the layers of cloth and into Eddie's skin. At last there is an intense feeling of relief and going home as his symbiote settles in around Eddie's organs.

 **We are here, Eddie.** Says a voice inside Eddie's brain. This time Eddie really does cry. He's overwhelmed. He rests his hand over the place where he can feel Venom still coming to rest inside of him.

"What took you so long?" Eddie asks.

**We are weak, Eddie. Tired. We've been sleeping. Healing. But wanted to be with you.**

"Can I help you get better?"

**Just rest, Eddie. Rest and food.**

"Gotcha." Eddie says. That's easy enough to do.

He almost screams with something furry brushes his face. It's only the cat, though. Devoid of Venom's presence now, it's rubbing against Eddie seeking attention. Eddie strokes it's head and vaguely hopes Venom doesn't plan on using the cat as food.

 **No. We are attached.** Venom answers the thought, and Eddie breathes out a sight of relief. Attached, indeed.

Eddie settles in to sleep, and Venom goes quiet. But Eddie can still feel them thrumming inside him, brushing against his mind as Venom drifts off to sleep too.

 **Thank you for coming back for us, Eddie.** Venom says. Eddie just hums. His sleep is easy this time around.

* * *

The look on Dan's face is priceless when their cat leaps right up into his lap the next time he and Anne stop by. Another voice laughs with Eddie and Eddie doesn't feel alone anymore.

 


End file.
